“This award is a reflection of the Saskatoon Poppy Fund Trustees’ wish to contribute towards the health and well-being of our veterans, but also of the people of Saskatchewan, Canada and the world”, said John Peters, Chairman of the Saskatoon Poppy Fund Trustees Committee during his recent visit to VIDO-InterVac along with several members of the Trustees Committee. “Supporting future generations of tuberculosis researchers in their training is one such initiative”.

“The Poppy Fund’s history of support, particularly for medical training and research to benefit veterans is well-recognized”, said Dr. Jeffrey Chen, the VIDO-InterVac scientist who is supervising the students. “Not only will this award enable the training of students, it will also contribute greatly towards the development of much needed vaccines and medicines to combat tuberculosis which has killed more than a billion people in human history”. According to the World Health Organization tuberculosis caused 1.8 million deaths and sickened 10.4 million individuals in 2015.

Tuberculosis research has been enabled at VIDO-InterVac by the certification of its world class containment level 3 facility. The $150 million facility was built with capital support from the Government of Canada, Government of Saskatchewan, City of Saskatoon, and University of Saskatchewan.